t.o.e and god

Discussions about the possibility of consciousness, free will, spirits, deities, religions and so on, and how these might interact with time travel, the Big Bang, many worlds and so on.

t.o.e and god

Postby papernuke » Sun Sep 17, 2006 4:32 am

if, someone found the t.o.e (theory of everything) wouldnt any god be ruled out or something?
"Civilization is a race between education and catastrophe."
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Postby batmanmg » Sun Sep 17, 2006 6:07 am

hardly... god doesn't exist in our realm... its supernatural.. toe is theory of everything natural i would assume... and one can always say.. out of the void of absolute nothingness, god created whatever toe hopes to uncover.
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Postby Nick » Sun Sep 17, 2006 12:31 pm

The T.O.E. can definitely rule out god. The Big Bang rules out god.
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Postby moonlord » Sun Sep 17, 2006 2:56 pm

irockyou wrote:The Big Bang rules out god.


Untrue. God has created the singularity, then disappeared. The singularity then exploded. <off topic> It can be argued whether Chuck Norris or the FSM has created God and then disappered on their own. </off topic>
"God does not play dice." -- Albert Einstein, early 1900's.
"Not only does God play dice, but... he sometimes throws them where we cannot see them." -- Stephen Hawking, late 1900's.
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Postby jinydu » Sun Sep 17, 2006 2:57 pm

irockyou wrote:The T.O.E. can definitely rule out god. The Big Bang rules out god.


No, the hypothesis that God exists is unfalsifiable. Believers can always claim that God just manipulated the Universe so that it appears to be governed by our scientific theories.

What scientific theories can do is make the hypothesis that God exists unecessary for explaining physical phenomena.
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Postby Nick » Mon Sep 18, 2006 9:51 am

jinydu wrote:
irockyou wrote:The T.O.E. can definitely rule out god. The Big Bang rules out god.


No, the hypothesis that God exists is unfalsifiable. Believers can always claim that God just manipulated the Universe so that it appears to be governed by our scientific theories.


Not if it contradicts their religious scripture, they can't. The Big Bang and Evolution rule out the Abrahamic religions, which is a good chunk of the population right there.
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Postby PWrong » Mon Sep 18, 2006 3:00 pm

Not if it contradicts their religious scripture, they can't. The Big Bang and Evolution rule out the Abrahamic religions, which is a good chunk of the population right there.

I don't think the church has a problem with contradicting the bible anymore. I read something the other day that supposedly explains the ten commandments. What it really did was fill in some of the gaping holes. For instance "do not kill" apparently includes any kind of assault :roll:.

The whole Jesus thing doesn't make sense anyway. I mean, he supposedly died in a noble self-sacrifice, so that God would forgive us for everything. But then he just came back three days later! I don't know where he's supposed to be now, but he's either still here, or he's in heaven where he belongs. Where's the big sacrifice? He went through some pain on the cross, and he spent three days dead. Is that really enough?

What scientific theories can do is make the hypothesis that God exists unecessary for explaining physical phenomena.

That's my main reason for being an atheist. If we proved that the universe was inevitable, then even if God exists, he didn't really do anything except let the universe happen.
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Postby gerren » Wed Oct 25, 2006 11:53 pm

The Big Bang and Evolution rule out the Abrahamic religions, which is a good chunk of the population right there.

how does the Big Bang rule out God? remember that the big bang is just a theory, which is a concept supported by many hypotheses. Has that actually been proven? no. Can those theories (evolution and Big Bang) and God live together harmoniously?? Yes. How do you know that God didnt make US through evolution? The person (i forgot his name) who discovered DNA and is a supporter of the evolution theory and who was a former atheist, is now a christian. The Big Bang theory is a very well supported theory because everything points towards it, but when god "supposedly" made the universe, how do you know he didnt design it through a Big Bang, which was supposedly the spot where time in THIS universe began. Only theories, which are not fact, can SUPPOSEDLY disprove the existense of God. Man only reached the moon 40 years ago, so now do people think that they can without a doubt disprove his existence?
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Postby papernuke » Thu Oct 26, 2006 12:32 am

because if the big bang is real, then, god couldnt have created the universe, the big bang has to have.
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Postby Nick » Thu Oct 26, 2006 1:37 am

The Big Bang did not take 6 days. You are right in that a theory is an idea supported by other hypotheses. But you must keep in mind that just because a whole idea is still a theory, doesn't mean that some parts of it haven't been proven. We have proven that humans evolved; as opposed to man being created from clay and woman being created from a man's rib, as the Bible suggests.

The only reason the Big Bang is still a theory is because there can be no proof of where the singularity came from to begin with. It is possible; without space and time, there is no causality, so a singularity could have came from nothing; but since the laws of causality exist now, we cannot repeat the test to prove that something can come from nothing. Therefore, the Big Bang can never be proven.

Did I explain that well?
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Postby gerren » Thu Oct 26, 2006 2:31 am

Yes, you explained that perfectly, but you must not take the passages of the bible so literally. Man's time is not God's time. What God may perceive to be 6 days could be 4 billion years in our time. The point is that when dealing with higher powers, man and what he perceives to be correct in his environment may be perceived totally different in God's environment.
The Big Bang took like what? less than a second?? It was just a tiny point of energy and matter smaller than an electron that exploded into what we now see as the universe, which is expanding outwards until what the scientists predict will be the Big Crunch. Have you ever seen a homo erectus evolve into a homo sapien before your eyes? I didnt think so. That is a little worthless argument but it was worth putting in there :) lol.

But how do you know that God did not put the point there in the first place knowing that in the future it would explode, causing the big bang? How do you know that God didnt create humans through evolution? Man was supposed to be created from the Earth, correct? The earth is made of every organic element needed to create life. It would make sense, if you were reading the bible very literally, for a man to have the chemical composition of earth because thats all we are, correct? We are basically Star Dust
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Postby houserichichi » Thu Oct 26, 2006 3:30 am

I'm curious...does it say in the bible that it's not to be taken so literally?
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Postby gerren » Thu Oct 26, 2006 3:51 am

I am picking up a bit of sarcasm from that comment, correct? Well i dont think there is a manual to the bible and how to read so the answer to your question is no, the bible does not say to read it too literally, but many biblical scholars almost always tend to not read it so literally. They tend to find the main points and the causes for why things happen just as a biology student may read their biology books looking for answers.
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Postby houserichichi » Thu Oct 26, 2006 5:11 am

No I didn't mean to ellicit sarcasm from my comment, I was genuinely curious. I understand the connection you're trying to make between literal readings of the bible and those of a biology student's textbook but I suspect that the latter is meant to be taken literally as the most accurate bit of knowledge on the subject at the time. Conversely, the bible or any other holy book is up for debate over the literal versus nonliteral interpretations strictly by reason of uncertainty in accuracy and whether the supernatural occurences could even happen in the first place.

My questioning the bible's self-literal interpretation was directly related to that of the biology student's text...the bible may or may not be read literally and that necessarily breaks groups of readers into sects (fundies and non-fundies, for instance) whereas textbooks in any science offer no alternative than to be read literally.

So when one says "what kind of a god would..." one could respond by saying "this particular god in this particular philosophical interpretation of this particular book". Seems to me that religious argument is pretty redundant because everyone takes the "word" differently even though the message is all the same.
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Postby Nick » Thu Oct 26, 2006 9:00 pm

If the Bible is taken seriously, you are contradicting reason due to the sheer number of contradictions. If you are not taking it literally, you are contradicting reason and faith; if you are going to change what is right and wrong about the Bible, and which parts are to be taken literally and which are symbolic, why even bother with the Bible at all?
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Postby gerren » Thu Oct 26, 2006 10:45 pm

Because I think that when reading the bible, it wouldnt be worth reading if you didnt take the time out to decide when to take it literally or not. Also, it becomes much more obvious when and when not to do it. The bible is a very important piece that was more of a symbolic/take the morals and the points of this passage and apply them to daily life type of book. Therefore, no person would contradict faith in God or reason by trying to take the bible to a less literal level. It would increase faith and show how the person is taking out the effort to examine the bible. As I said, it takes much more time to read and understand the bible if you use those literary elements
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Postby houserichichi » Fri Oct 27, 2006 2:51 am

My only qualm with interpreting the bible or any holy book is that there is no manual out there to say how, exactly, it is supposed to be taken. Whether certain stories are taken literally, all are, or none are, is entirely up to the reader. Now, I agree that any faithful person necessarily must read their text cover to cover and truly "know" it (just like I must "know" number theory) but the difference between my knowing and a faithful person's knowing is that my books are meant to be taken literally whereas holy books might not (we don't really know, whether they're written by man or not. For all we know the gods could have spoken to the scribes directly and instructed them just not to include that piece of information). At any rate, I personally feel that these are the things that cause the turmoil all across the globe - not the religions themselves nor the words in their books, but in fact the people reading the words in the books that dictate the religions. If every book was written to be taken literally we'd all be living in a hellish world, but at the same time there wouldn't be any doubt as to the relevancy of any religious taboos (premarital sex, cloning, cursing, sacrificing, weekend stonings, etc)

I do hope I'm not droning on too much.
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Postby gerren » Fri Oct 27, 2006 3:39 am

I agree totally with you. You are very correct in that context. Every word was worth it.
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Postby gerren » Fri Oct 27, 2006 5:07 am

The whole Jesus thing doesn't make sense anyway. I mean, he supposedly died in a noble self-sacrifice, so that God would forgive us for everything. But then he just came back three days later! I don't know where he's supposed to be now, but he's either still here, or he's in heaven where he belongs. Where's the big sacrifice? He went through some pain on the cross, and he spent three days dead. Is that really enough?


Pwrong, have you ever been crucified, beaten, tortured, having to carry a huge wooden cross on your back for a mile, and then killed? No. No person has had that happen to them besides Jesus and maybe a couple of other people, but then to also be rejected by the people that you live for? I think thats enough anyone can take. Obviously he came back 3 days later to prove that he is a higher being and to also meet with his fellow apostles and everyone else to strenghten their faith in his divinity.
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Postby PWrong » Fri Oct 27, 2006 11:04 am

Pwrong, have you ever been crucified, beaten, tortured, having to carry a huge wooden cross on your back for a mile, and then killed?

Not yet, but I'll have worse than that when I go to hell, won't I? Compared to that, crucifixion would be great. So why should Jesus' relatively insignificant suffering change God's mind? Especially when God is above time, and never needs to change His mind.

No person has had that happen to them besides Jesus and maybe a couple of other people, but then to also be rejected by the people that you live for?

A couple? You think the Romans only crucified a few people?
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Postby gerren » Fri Oct 27, 2006 8:07 pm

My point is that the other criminals did not have to go through the pain and suffering that Jesus did. Your point about God having to change his mind is also wrong. Jesus was God, but more like a separate entity, so all he tried to do was tell the separate entity in Heaven was to forgive them and not to hold a bad view of them (sort of; this is a touch issue and I will probably have to consult one of my sources on this one :) )

Jesus' relatively insignificant suffering

Ill also have you know that his suffering was not significant at all. It was a landmark event in Christian history/bible.
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Postby Nick » Fri Oct 27, 2006 10:08 pm

Actually, a lot of people were tortured like Jesus. To the Romans, Jesus was nothing more than the average criminal; a false prophet. Nothing new, nothing special. Heck, the Romans could have done worse.
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Postby gerren » Fri Oct 27, 2006 11:55 pm

Yes, in the respect of crusifixion, but if you put all of the other facts and happenings into play, then no, no other criminal went through what he did.
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Postby PWrong » Sat Oct 28, 2006 10:57 am

Yes, in the respect of crusifixion, but if you put all of the other facts and happenings into play, then no, no other criminal went through what he did.

As irockyou said, Jesus was treated like an ordinary criminal. So the other criminals would have gone through everything he did.

Anyway, my point was that the crucifixion was nothing compared to what happens in Hell. God was going to put all those people through infinite suffering for all eternity. But his son let himself be tortured and crucified (a finite amount of suffering), and that somehow makes up for it?
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Postby Nick » Sat Oct 28, 2006 11:23 am

Also, why did God need to impregnate some women and torture the Baby? Why couldn't he just forgive our sins?
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Postby gerren » Tue Oct 31, 2006 1:53 am

Also, why did God need to impregnate some women and torture the Baby? Why couldn't he just forgive our sins?


Obviously, if he just forgave us for our sins, wouldnt that make him seem more like a weak being who is easy on the punches? The sacrifice Jesus made had to be so empowering and great that no person would take what happened for granted.

look at it this way:
1. Would God rather just forgive man and let him sin just like before?
2. Would God rather make a huge event that would end up making him forgive man for his sin and instilling a great awe in the sinners to help them not sin anymore?
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Postby PWrong » Tue Oct 31, 2006 8:55 am

Obviously, if he just forgave us for our sins, wouldnt that make him seem more like a weak being who is easy on the punches? The sacrifice Jesus made had to be so empowering and great that no person would take what happened for granted.

Then why wasn't it? The majority of people either take it for granted, don't believe it happened or just don't care.

1. Would God rather just forgive man and let him sin just like before?

That's pretty much what he did isn't it? Except that we only get to take advantage of his "forgiveness" if we suck up to him.

2. Would God rather make a huge event that would end up making him forgive man for his sin and instilling a great awe in the sinners to help them not sin anymore?

You'd think so, but he didn't. The closest thing he did was let his son be tortured. That got some undeserved attention from a lot of people, but it didn't stop them sinning, did it?
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Postby Nick » Tue Oct 31, 2006 11:13 am

I think option 1 is more likely. People would think "wow God, you rule!" instead of "OMG your weak" if he forgave their sins.
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Postby gerren » Thu Nov 02, 2006 2:45 am

Well, yeah, they would say "God you rock", but would still think of him as a weaker being because he obviously didnt stress what he wanted enough. Would you rather have your basketball coach make you do 30 push-ups for air-balling a free-throw or just let him forgive you and forget about it? Obviously you would want option 2, but you would still think of the coach as a much weaker one than one who made you do those push-ups.
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Postby Nick » Thu Nov 02, 2006 2:48 am

Obviously you would want option 2, but you would still think of the coach as a much weaker one than one who made you do those push-ups.


Obviously :roll: . Would you rather, after getting a C on a math test, have your dad whip you 30 times, or have a quiet discussion about good study habits and the importance of education? Tell me, which is more effective? By your logic, you would say option 1, because it makes your dad look stronger.
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